Wild Times
by gabriel blessing
Summary: My final series from back in the 90's: One is a brash martial artist. The other is a mysterious guardian. A story of burdens and blessings
1. Chapter 1

Wild Time

By Gabriel Blessing

Prologue

_Author's note. Honestly. Who saw that coming? Go on, tell the truth. That's right. No one. I wrote this piece specifically for the Church of Time and Chaos. Type it into google and see if the place is still there if you wish. It was a sight specifically for Ranma/Setsuna matchups. The owner/creator/whatever (I have never been, nor ever will be especially tech savvy) complimented me on "Finishing what you start" and in return for the flattering letter, I wrote this story for their site. Please enjoy my work, which I hope is as completely off the wall unusual in it's premise now as it was back then!_

Disclaimer. Not mine.

Quiet. Peaceful. The park is a beautiful oasis of green in the great city that is my home. Trees, the gentle viridian giants swaying softly in a light breeze. Quiet paths stretching amongst them where lovers and friends can enjoy a quiet moment of peace together. A single lake, like a diamond, laps softly at its shore. The light reflecting off of the ever-so-slightly choppy water.

And in I come.

"a… a… a… a… a… a… a… aauuuGGGHHHHHH!!!!!!!!" SPLASH!

Yup. In I come.

I surface from the center of the surprisingly, and thankfully, deep pond that's really a drainage ditch in disguise, sputtering and spitting. The water had been cold and I was wearing a thin t-shirt. Looks like I would be in danger of stares and T.H.O as I walked home to day. What a great way to finish of a wonderful day. I take a towel from the woman by the edge of the pond who had offered me a hand out and began drying off.

"Stupid fiancés! Where do they get of calling me that? Just because they're all obsessed with sex they gotta take their frustrations out on me! I have half a mind to marching back there-no, thank you-" I interrupt my vicious muttering to turn down the woman's offer of a new shirt as I turn my attention to my hair. It takes forever to dry, damn it, "-marching back there and WHAM! BAM! I have half a mind..."

Wait a second. The woman giving me a towel? Who the hell? I blink twice before peering out from beneath the towel that I had been using to clean my hair. Yup. Not a hallucination brought on by the depressurization of my rapid descent. I tense up a second to leap backwards, before realizing that if she was gonna do anything to me, she probably would have done it by now. But still. A woman hanging around a drainage pond with a towel? That's strange even for my life. Especially with a woman dressed in a rather stunning business suit. And what's with her hair? I've never seen anyone else with anything near that color.

It's right about than that my ultra-sensitive 'weird stuff' sense starts to kick in on overdrive. And when I say ultra-sensitive, I mean ultra-sensitive.

"Um," I mutter, "Hi?"

"Hello," the woman murmurs in response. She has a strange way of talking. It's smooth and quiet, controlled, but like velvet. It makes me feel all tingly just listening to it. Kind of cool actually.

"Yea. Um, thanks for the towel. Can I ask why you have one? I mean, it's kind of weird to be just walking around with one in the middle of the park. Unless you're going swimming?" Swimming in a drainage pond. It's not the weirdest of things. I mean, I just got out of one, didn't I? Now that I've kind of gotten out of my shocked mode, I start toweling myself off again, though more slowly.

"I have one incase I need to dry off," the woman tells me. She brushes a strand of that strange colored hair back. The both of us are standing on the green embankment next to the pond, a couple of feet away from a path. I plop down onto the ground so I can towel off my pants without hopping around like a fool. The woman, despite the fact that her suit looks expensive as the earth, kneels gracefully down next to me.

"Um, right. Drying off. Never tell when that's gonna happen." I finish off as best I can, and drape the now soggy towel around my shoulders before leaning back a bit. I look at the strange lady out of the corner of my eyes again. Let's see, besides the strange hair, she has strange eyes as well. She moves like she's a martial artist (I know, I can judge these things. After all, I am the best), even in something as simple as kneeling. And despite the fact that she's actually kind of short, she projects herself. Just being around her I find myself unconsciously hunching my shoulders down. She reminds me of the old ghoul, for some reason.

She's also incredibly attractive.

I quickly turn my head away with that thought. It wouldn't be good to go around blushing like a schoolgirl. Definitely not good at all. And it's also bad to go around staring at beautiful women. Especially with my problems.

"Have I offended?" the woman asks me, having caught my quick turn away.

"Heh, heh. No not at all. Just..." just what? Come on, good excuse, good excuse. "Just looking at the sunset!"

"Yes," the woman answers, sounding amused. "It is very beautiful. But isn't it over here?"

Alright it was a bad excuse. Sue me. "R-right!" The lady just smiles at me, an understanding smile. That in itself is pretty weird. Understanding, not mocking. Like she was laughing with me, rather than at. A little bit of time passes in silence, and finally it starts to catch up with me. Sorry, but silence makes me nervous. I must kill it whenever possible.

"Look," I start. "You're handling all this pretty well. I mean, the towel, my entrance." I'm not really going anywhere with this, just talking to keep from being quiet. "Can I ask... I mean how are... I mean..." What do I mean.

"Why am I taking this so easily?" she asks softly.

"Um," I start intelligently. "Yea?"

In response she just smiles, and then stands in one swift and graceful movement. Despite the fact that she was just sitting in the grass, her suit remains immaculate. Then she turns and walks away. I gawk for a second (I can't help it. It was sudden, and besides...She has a great ass and when I'm on the ground and she's on her feet...) before stumbling to my feet, tripping over myself like a kid in my haste.

"Hey, lady!" I shout. "Your towel!" I don't know how, but in the second it takes for me to stand, she's already covered like a dozen meters. She was approaching a bend in the path that would take her behind a tree.

"You can keep it," she tells me. Her voice is still soft, but it reaches my ears easily.

"Wait!" I shout then, tripping off after her. She stops in obedience, turning to look over her shoulder at me without turning around. I stagger to a stop behind her, sopping wet despite her towel and all messed up while she remains the poster girl of perfect. A breeze rustles the tree leaves around us, and she tucks back a strand of her amazingly colored hair that had somehow gotten loose behind her ear.

"I..." I trail off for a second, unable to think of anything. The lady smiles slightly and waits patiently for whatever it is that I'm going to say. Finally, I settle on a question. "What's your name?"

The woman's smile widens at that. "My name? You can call me Ranko. And I'm sorry about this, Setsuna Meioh." and with a flash of her crimson hair she turns around the bed in the path.

I stand there frozen for a second. How had she known my name? And what was that with 'you can call me Ranko'? How did she know my name? Was Ranko her name or not? And also, how did she know my name?

"Hey," I shout again. I start to speed off, clearing the bend in the path. "How do you..." I trail off. The path clearly extends for nearly two dozen meters, but nowhere on that expanse is that redhead who I can call Ranko.

Oh well. That had definitely rated a seven point six on my weird-shit-o-meter. Never mind.

I tuck a strand of my viridian hair behind my ear, wincing as I discover that the little ball of it I keep up on the back of my head had shaken loose in the flight. Might as well get back to that place where I'm staying. It wouldn't be half bad if it wasn't for that jerk. Who does my father think he is, engaging me to some guy out of nowhere? Or to a bunch of guys? Or a bunch of girls, for that matter? What's are girl supposed to do?

"Stupid," I mutter, and start my trip back to the craziness.

End of Prologue


	2. Chapter 2

Wild Time

By Gabriel Blessing

Chapter 1

_Author's new notes: Just to explain the disclaimer, this was written not to long after the O.J. Trials. Okay, a while after, but I had just seen a movie (which for the life of me I can't remember) that made fun of that line (now that I think of it, could it have been an episode of Saturday Night Live?) and it struck me as amusing to use it. Anyway, it is important when reading this fic to keep in mind Setsuna is actually the one talking. The juxtaposition of her real character and my interpretation just keeps making it funny. Seriously. _

Disclaimer. As you can plainly see, the keyboard does not fit.

The first thing I can think when I get up is, 'damn, what a hangover.'

The second thing I can think (about ten minutes later) is, 'damn, what a hangover."

Five minutes after that, my brain manages to squeeze out a, 'Geez, what a stench,' thought.

The time to associate the stench with myself was less then immediate.

Slowly, oh-so-painfully slowly, I crawl out of my futon enough to get a glimpse at my alarm clock. Mid-afternoon. That's good. Now I just need to get a clock that displays the date so I can know which day it is. Oh well, judging from the lack of commotion, I probably haven't slept through anything important. Groaning I fall back on my bed.

This is all those damn Jupitarians' fault. Them and their damn drugs.

----

Hold on. Back up. Perhaps I should give a little better of an introduction before things start getting hot and heavy.

Hi. My name's Setsuna Meioh. Don't laugh or I'll kick your ass. I'm a practitioner of the Meioh Any-time-Any place style of martial arts. Probably a master of it, too. I'm seventeen. How did I get to be a master at such a tender and oh so precocious age? The answer is simple. The last twelve of those seventeen years I've been on a training trip. Me and my old man went just about everywhere. We studied and sparred on Neptune, Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, a bunch of moons and asteroids, all over the place. You pick up a lot when you travel. Finally, after I was good enough, my pops brought me back here. Good old Pluto. My home planet. And then he sprung it on me. The engagement. Turns out that the only reason he brought me back was to marry me to some old-schmuck-o- his' daughter.

Yes, daughter. One of three.

Now some of you more centralized reader (those of you still on or near Earth and the Moon) might be wondering, 'Wait a second! Girl on girl?' Well the thing is, that out here where the population is a lot sparser, you got to be more open minded about a lot of things. Same sex marriages happen all the time. Offspring from those are produced through cloning and a whole bunch of other scientific crap. Which leads me to my current predicament. The engagement.

But after that, things only get worse. Remember that training trip? Well, apparently, so does every one else. Pops seems to have made it his personal goal in life to piss off anyone with a smidgen of martial arts ability. He has succeeded admirably. It seems to be a dual goal of blaming it all on his daughter, me. In that too has he succeeded.

Now that I'm settling down and getting ready for 'married life' every nut with a grudge in the system seems to be catching up with me.

And that explains my current situation. Hung over and stinking. Back to the story.

---

Whatever substance those Jupitarians had managed to souse me with has started to wear off, and now I'm feeling it. Humph. Best way to wipe out a hangover is a good old long soak in the bath. And with this in mind, I start my arduous journey to the land of the clean.

I set off down the corridor between me and the bathroom trailing clothes and sheets like a slug trailing slime. By the time I manage to make it to the door the throbbing in my head is starting to back down a bit. I open the door and brush in to the room. In a couple of quick movements I relieve myself of my clothing, wrinkling my noses at the stench on them, and open the divisor between the changing room and the actual bath. Plunking down with an audible plop, I start the lathering.

I had finished off the majority of the cleaning, and was rinsing the suds off when I felt it. It was like low throb, warm like a heat lamp coming from behind me. Oh no. I know this feeling. Slowly I turn around, and find myself face to face with my also naked and soapy fiancé. Akane. The warm feeling that I had felt had been her battle aura flaring into life.

"P-p-p-!" she begins to stutter as she worked herself up into a killing rage. Oh great. She's going to call me that ridiculous name and send me flying. I quickly grab the pile of clean clothes I had left near the door. This is so not what my hangover needs.

"PRUDE!" she screams, and then sends me flying.

I don't know. Maybe it's me, not having been raised on Pluto and traveling all over the place, but I tend to think that walloping someone because they didn't look at you naked is a pretty stupid reason. But the thing is that on Pluto it's customary to give people a polite once over whenever you come across them in the buck. Hell, doing what I just did and not even noticing is like a major social blunder. Of course that's cause just about everyone on this planet is obsessed with doing the nasty.

And with that thought, I find myself once more in the stratosphere, bare assed naked and trailing my clothes like Charley Brown taking a line drive.

Quickly gathering my attire before my descent begins, I brush off the last of the suds and get dressed midair. It's kind of scary what slowly ends up becoming routine. Like I was saying earlier, everyone on Pluto seems obsessed with sex for some reason. Maybe it has to do with having something to do on cold nights, I don't know. All I know is that there's a saying around the system. 'Loose as a Plutonian.'

Oh well. You can't pick your family.

After my three point landing (face first on a patch of briars) I turn my thoughts as to what I intend to do today. Since today is a Saturday (hence: no school) I have pretty much the day to myself. I just hope I can keep it that way. It's been a while since I've had some time to just lay about and relax. I have way too much stress in my life.

And so it is that I find myself walking the streets of downtown Tokyo (Named after some old city back on Earth). The streets around me are filled with the milling throng. Herds of people rushing this way and that. The buildings around were bright and festive, the people cheerful and undemanding. You know, I think today might end up pretty good. Why, I'll bet...

GRUMBLE.

My stomach makes itself known, in a most audible fashion. The people around me all stop and stare a second at me, and I blush in embarrassment despite myself.

I have no money for food.

Today is going to suck.

---

"So hungry," I moan, collapsing theoretically on a set of steps leading up to a building. My stomach groans again, and I groan in response. "I'd do anything for a burger right about now." I cock my head to the side, waiting for a response. I hadn't been aiming the question at anyone, but I wouldn't put it past my luck to have some sort of soul snatching demon come up and try to take me up on the offer. When nothing happens, I groan again, and take a look at where I'm sitting. It's a pretty standard set of stairs. Made of concrete, about three feet across, ten inches deep. Four of them in total, leading up to a boring and mundane door. No food here. Must move on.

As I'm standing up I lean over a bit and something catches my eye. Next to the steps is a set of railing, designed to keep people from tripping over a second set of stairs. This set is a bit longer, and descends about ten feet below street level leading to a door right under the stairs I had been slouching on a second ago. A sign above the door reads 'Clinic and Chiropractor'.

Hey. Maybe they have some kind of free cookie thing in the waiting room. Nothing to lose but time. I vault over the railing, taking the drop easily and let myself in.

A blast of pleasantly warm air hits me, and I squint for a second as my eyes adjust to the dimmer lights in the building. The door opened up to another set of doors (Your standard setup to keep stuff like snow or rain from blowing in. Beyond that door is a rather small waiting room. The room is comfortably furnished with plush chairs for those waiting for their appointments I guess. A T.V. in the corner flashes scenes from some overly dramatic soap opera while the volume remains to low for any of the conversation to be made out.

I take another couple of steps in, catching sight of a little partitioned off desk area. I lean over the counter, looking for some kind of receptionist, or maybe a little basket of candy or something, but nothing catches my eye.

"Can I help you?" a soft voice asks from directly behind me.

"AAUGH!" I screech, surprised. I loose my balance and fall the rest of the way over the counter, landing on my face on a little swivel chair. "MMPH!" I declare as my feet kick around in the air and I try to get myself out of my position. A strong pair of hands grab hold of my legs and give me a push. Like a seesaw I come back to a properly upright position.

"Are you alright? the voice asks again, sounding torn between concern and amusement. I gasp a couple more times, before spinning around.

"W-who are you?" I manage to get out. Whoever he is, he's good. If he had came in off the street after me I should have heard a door open. If he had been here in the clinic before I should have seen him when I was looking the place over. But I hadn't heard or felt a thing either way.

"Who am I?" he asks, sounding surprised. "This is my clinic. I should be asking you that." I take a good look at him as my control returns to my grasp. Medium height, with black hair done up in some kind of pigtail, or braid or something. He's wearing something that looks like a red and black O.R. scrub made out of silk or something. And he's a looker. Man what a body.

"I'm Setsuna Meioh of the Any-time-Any-place style of martial arts," I introduce myself, striking a pose.

Something I said seemed to amuse the man, because he smiles slightly as he bows to me. "It is a pleasure to meet you, Miss Meioh. My name is Ranma Saotome, chiropractor by trade. Welcome to my clinic."

I nod and grin at him. "Nice place you got here. Kind of empty though. Shouldn't you have some one waiting in here, or working the counter, or something?"

His smile remains as he answers. "That..." he gets only a word in before my stomach reminds me that it needs food.

GRRRUUMMBBBLLLLEEEE!

"Heh, heh, heh," I laugh sheepishly, blushing a bit. He stares at my stomach for a second, eyes wide in surprise at the sheer volume of the noise that it had produced, before his smile returns. "That is a question best answered over a plate of cookies and a cup of tea. If you can wait just one moment, without eating any of my furniture, I shall return with both."

He leaves the room to get some snacks, and I smirk again. What a great guy.

That Ranma guy returns a minute later to the sight of me making myself comfortable in one of the waiting room chairs. The T.V. is now showing something worth watching: a martial art tournament. I left the volume down though. Didn't want to have to put up with any sort of stupid announcer throwing in his two cents every thirty seconds. The moment the tray hits the little table next to the chairs, I help myself to a stack of cookies. By the time he's poured the tea, I was helping myself to a second stack.

"So, doc," I start, displaying my awesome prowess by not spilling a drop of food despite the fact that I had five cookies in my mouth. "What's the story?"

After giving me an odd look, he takes a sip of tea. "First off, please. Just call me Ranma," he starts.

"Sure thing, doc," I tell him.

He gives me a dry look before continuing as though I hadn't interrupted him. "And as for why I don't have any customers...Well, than can be blamed on my last receptionist."

"How?" I ask. "Did you fire her?" He nods to my question, helping himself to a cookie, and take a slow bite of it. "How does that affect your customers?"

"I had to take over my appointment book and reschedule all my customers until I can find a new receptionist. I was just talking to an applicant when you dropped in."

"Well, why did you fire her?" I ask.

"She broke the rule," Ranma tells me.

"What rule?" In response, he taps a sign over his shoulder that I hadn't noticed earlier. The sign read 'Absolutely no sex in the clinic. This means you'. "Oh." He continues to eat his cookie in a slow and calm fashion. "You must not get a lot of customers then." Seriously. Seducing doctors and dentists is almost a sport. They have magazines on that kind of thing, right next to the skating and hunting ones.

"I've had some trouble building up a clientele," he admits. "But the customers that do come back are usually interesting people, or people that need quick attention. I earn enough to get by."

I guess I'm feeling pretty sorry for the guy by now. I mean, he seems like a nice guy. Quiet, polite, hot. I don't know if he's any good at chiropracting, or whatever the word is, but if he's half as good at it as he is at sneaking up on people than next time I'm in pain I'm stopping by. I wonder how he did that sneaking up thing anyway.

"Hey," I start, liberating another cookie, and slugging back half of my tea. "Do you practice any martial arts?"

Ranma looks nervous for a bit, but answers. "Well, yes, once. But not for a bit, and only on my own."

Oh well. So much for sparring.

"So what are you doing down in a quiet clinic on a fine Saturday afternoon?" he continues. He must have noticed me wince at that. "Something wrong?"

"Nah," I tell him. "It's just that that's a strange story. Kind of crazy, actually."

"Well," he smiles at me. "Since you've eaten all of my cookies, it's only fair that you tell me it." I look at the plate where my hand had been groping for food, and found it empty. Oh my, I ate them all. How embarrassing.

"Well, it starts a little something like this..."

End chapter 1


	3. Chapter 3

Wild Time

By Gabriel Blessing

_Author's new note: More development. Just the basic stuff. A thickening of the plot, if you will._

Chapter 2

Disclaimer. The characters and situations aren't mine. Yet.

SLAM!

The door flies and open and bashes the wall next to it as I step in. I move a bit to the side so that when it misses while it rebounds shut. I stomp through into the middle of the waiting room of Ranma's Clinic and Chiropractor building and plop myself down onto one of the cushy chairs. This time I'll see it. I've positioned myself so that I can see both the exit and the door to the back room easily. There's no way in hell he'll be able to sneak up on me this time...

"Why hello. Is everything all right Setsuna?" a voice speaks up from right behind me.

"EEK!" I shriek, startled, and my reaction to the surprise of discovering that Ranma was right behind me leaves me clinging to the ceiling and shaking like a sugar fiend half way through a box of Lucky Charms. "DAMNIT! Every time! How do you do that!?!?"

"Oh my," he responds calmly, both hands clasped behind his back and his head cocked to the side as he peers up at me. "You seem awfully high strung today. Would you like a cup of tea and a plate of cookies?"

One deep breath later I return to the floor. "You have no idea how weird today was," I tell him primly.

"I'll get the chocolate-mint wafers," he tells me sympathetically. Chocolate-mint wafers. If there is anything in the universe better than chocolate-mint wafers, then... well, then nothing. The simple fact is that there is nothing better in the universe than chocolate-mint wafers.

"You do that," I tell his back as he heads off to the back rooms. While he's gone I start pacing around the clinic. A quick glance at the receptionist desk shows that it is once more empty. Jeez. He goes through those like a cold victim through tissues.

---

Now, some of you readers might be wondering to yourselves, 'My, my. What IS going on?' Others might be simply going 'duh?' Either way, let me give you a quick rundown of why I am once more at the Ranma's clinic.

It's the one oasis of sanity left in my life. That's why.

During my first meeting, after I had told Ranma my story, he had been sympathetic. After a nice cathartic cookie binge he had extended me the invitation to drop by whenever I needed some cookies again. Which is kind of cool, because if he said whenever I needed to talk to anyone, I would have ignored him completely. However, with the offer of food, my return was almost guaranteed.

The next day, after a scuffle between some of my fiancées, (Akane, some guy from Jupiter with a penchant for drugs, and another guy from Mars that enjoys making pizza) I dropped by and discovered that however good Ranma is at sneaking up at people, he's even better at patching them up. After that well, it was only natural to drop by whenever something happened. Some rival from a moon around Saturn, or a run in with the things that Akane calls cooking, an attempt at seduction, or just whenever I get knocked out of the house before I have the opportunity to eat. There's always a good reason to stop by.

Great cookies too.

---

"What happened to the new receptionist? What's-her-face? Vicky?" I ask Ranma when he returns. While he places the tray down on table by the chairs, he taps the wall behind him with one hand. Next to the "Absolutely no sex" sign a new one has been placed up. "Please refrain from seducing the doctor."

"Again?" I ask, kind of awed by it. It's amazing how many he's resisted, and discouraging at that. If he refuses the others so easily, how does that affect my chances? "How many is that now? Eight?"

"Yes," he sighs quietly. "It's so hard to find good help these days," he continues in his calm tone of voice, and helps himself to a wafer. He takes a sip as I shove five cookies into my mouth and begin munching. "So. Would you like to tell me how your day was?"

"Sure," I mumble out, the sound muffled by the cookies in my mouth. "It went a little something like this..."

---

"PRUDE!" Akane bellows at me, before unleashing a mallet. You know, it's not like I enjoy being malleted, but the most annoying part of the whole ritual is the whole 'prude' part. I'm not a prude, damn it. I like sex as much as the next Plutonion. It's just that I don't want to do it with her, that's all. Of course, if I tell her that a mallet will be the least of my concerns.

"Stupid tomboy!" I manage to make out as I'm propelled through the air. Below me Mousse turns to start yelling at Akane for knocking me into next week. Mousse is originally from Jupiter, some kind of barbarian tribe there. It seems that I made such a good impression on them when I stopped by for some training that the tribe as a whole married me to him. The biggest problem with this is that they never told me about this little arrangement. So when I left, they organized a little task force containing my want-to-be husband and his grandmother, a twisted little gnome called Cologne, to come and get me. Some chick that has a crush on this Mousse character named Shampoo tagged along, but she's more interested in killing me and claiming her beloved then dragging me back, so it's easier to deal with her.

After a long flight (I don't need to describe it, after you've heard about one you've heard about them all) I find myself once more down town bereft of food and cash. A moment of privacy was nice though. Sighing, I turn towards home and begin the trip.

"The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step," I mutter to myself. I was dressed in a green Jupiter style shirt (Author's note. That's kind of like one of those Chinese shirts where one side crosses all the way over to the other before it buttons down. It's similar but different to the shirts Ranma wears in the canon universe) and a comfortable pair of black pants. I start to hum as I tuck my hands behind my head as I walk, and I let my elbows swing back and forth in time with my steps.

To the left of me are a bunch of tall office buildings, with little signs that proclaim the names of the owners. The signs don't even bother saying what the offices are for. I guess that the only people interested in their business have to hunt them down. It's not like you get a lot of impulse buying/window shopping for lawyers and accountants. Across the street to my right more simple stores: coffee shops, drug stores, and private retailers. Every couple of blocks or so a street vendor has decided to station themselves, providing a bunch of really neat smells like hotdogs and stuff. Another nice day. I guess getting walloped across town wasn't that bad after...

GRUMBLE.

I sign and slump forward in defeat. I. Just. Can't. Win.

"Hey lady. You hungry?" a voice says behind me.

I grunt. "Yea. And broke too." Suddenly a delicious smell wafts under my nose. I peers up through my hair, which had fallen in front of me, and come face to face with a corndog. Further traveling of my eyes reveals one of those street vendors I had seen earlier behind the offered food.

"On the house. Just do something nice for someone else today," the guy grins.

"...Thanks," I thank him, and then lit up with a smile while I took the offered corndog. I move on, taking small bites of the food to make it last longer.

"Well," I mumble to myself through a mouth full of delicious snack food. "That was pretty cool." I casually tilt my head to the side to get a better angle at the food, and when I do so a flash of red catches my sight. Chewing, I move for a better look.

SPATUEY! Some guy next to me finds himself suddenly a lot more disgusting when I spit out the food I had been munching on a second ago. That flash of red. Hair. Red hair, combined with a business suit, and one of the most provocative walks I have ever seen.

Ranko.

Two blocks down from me on my right. She's facing away from me, but that doesn't matter. I can tell it's her anyway.

I open my mouth to shout at her, get her attention, but then stop. Who was she? How had she known my name? I think now might call for some covert operating. I start to follow her, keeping a block back at all times.

After a three minute, and an altogether anticlimactic chase scene, I stop at the end of the block and peer through a window display as the woman called Ranko sits herself down at a open air coffee cafe. I kept watching for another minute, and then another woman joins her. The new woman is taller than Ranko, but just as graceful. She has small wave of rich black hair that just brushes the tips of her shoulders and she's wearing fashionable black dress. She, like Ranko, is incredibly hot. Together the two of them cut quite an elegant pair. The two start talking as a waiter brings them both drinks.

I step back from the window I'm looking through, so that the wall is between us. I've come this far, nothing left to do but follow through. After a quick loop around the block, I'm now approaching the cafe from behind the two. A second later, and I'm two tables away, and blocked from their sight by a row of decorative potted plants. And now for some eavesdropping.

"Are you sure about she's the one?" is the phrase that greets me as I start listening in. It doesn't sound like the voice that I remember being Ranko's, so it must be the other chick. "From what I've seen, she's a lot different."

"Yes," Ranko answers, and I get a warm tingle all up and down my spine. Is it just me, or is it getting warm in here? How can anyone have such a sexy voice? "I suppose she is. But you must remember, Ho-chan (author's note I hate using Japanese lingo in an English fic, but I can't think of any other way to translate the expression), I never knew her from before."

"Yes. Yes, I suppose you didn't. I apologize, Ran-chan."

"There is no need."

The two stop talking for a second, and the sound of drinking meets my ears. Right about then, I realize that I'm still clutching a half eaten corndog. A quick bite tells me its still good, so I chow down.

"Ran-chan..." the woman with the short hair starts. Ranko had called her Ho-chan, but that doesn't really say much about what her real name might be.

"Yes?"

"I've never asked this of you before. I haven't really felt its my place," the woman begins, and then hesitates. My ears perk up. "What will happen to you after all this is over?"

"I don't know," Ranko answers.

"Ran-chan...You know..." the woman begins slowly. "You are always welcome, to me. When this is all over, when you've finished it...You could come live with me."

My jaw drops mid-chew. Was that a proposal? Wow, did I ever pick a time to start eavesdropping! I can't help myself. I scrunch down at my table so that I can see the two women through a gap in the plants. "Ho-chan" is looking up through her bangs at Ranko shyly, playing with the rim of her mug of coffee. The redhead under question is sitting up primly in her chair, with impeccable posture, though her head is bowed.

"Hotaru," Ranko begins and then stops. Slowly, the redhead reaches out and takes one of the other woman's hands. "I...Your offer is tempting. So tempting. But I..."

Hotaru leans forward at this, interrupting. "I know what you're going to say, Ranko. Don't. She's gone now. She's been gone for a very long time. She's just a ghost now. Don't let a ghost destroy your future." As the woman Ranko had called Hotaru spoke, her voice became more and more impassioned. At the end of her tirade, she had moved her chair to right in front of Ranko's. The look in the short haired woman's eyes was so intense it makes my breath catch. Wow, this is heating up.

"I can make no promises, Hotaru. You know that," the redhead whispers. I can barely hear her.

Hotaru's only response to this is to lean in more and kiss Ranko. The two's hands remain held in front of each other and the remain in their seats, but somehow the kiss comes off to me as the most passionate thing I have ever seen in my life. I start to blush before I realize it. After the kiss goes on for a minute or so, I kind of start to get...uncomfortable. Looking around, I'm at least glad to realize that I'm not the only one watching. The sight of two beautiful women playing tonsil tennis is enough to get the eyes of everyone present.

Finally, Hotaru breaks off the kiss. Standing slowly, she steps next to the still Ranko. Ranko still has her eyes closed. Leaning forward, the beautiful black haired babe whispers, "I'll wait." And with that, the woman called Hotaru left.

---

"After that Ranko walked off, and when I tried to follow her, she had just disappeared again," I finish off. After a quick chug of my tea to wet my throat after talking I look at Ranma. Nothing. His face is completely expression less, his head bent and eyes covered by his bangs. Sometime during the story he had tucked his arms into his sleeves. After a couple of seconds of silence, I start to get uncomfortable. So, I kill the silence.

"What do you think?" I ask, and eat another cookie.

He answers. "I think that you saw something very, very personal. I also think that you shouldn't eavesdrop anymore."

Damn. Upon further studying, I think he's right. I've seen people claim to be in love before, but everything I've ever seen is kinda pathetic compared to the way that Hotaru chick kissed Ranko. Just knowing that I had been spying on them when it happened makes me feel kinda shitty. Best thing to do in a situation like this? Act like it's not really that important and change the subject. "I wonder who they were talking about at the beginning? All they called her was 'she'."

After another second of silence, Ranma answers. "You said this 'Ranko' didn't know her from before? But that this 'Hotaru' did?"

"Yea, yea. But they only talked about her for a second, and it was so cryptic," I complain. Suddenly a thought hit me, and I stiffen for a second. Is it possible?

Ranma apparently notices, and asks me about it. "Is something wrong, Setsuna?"

I answer slowly. "This 'she' they were talking about. Do you think it might be me?" Am I being paranoid, or were they really talking about me?

Ranma has no answer for me.

End of Chapter 2


	4. Chapter 4

Wild Time

By Gabriel Blessing

_Author's new notes: At last, the plot thickens. And yes, this story has a plot, for all you doubting first readers. It just takes a while to really get there. Anyway, sorry for the long update wait. The real world just had to pile things up in my path. Honestly, sometimes my life seems so sitcom-y that I wonder if I can sell the rights to fox for some spending cash. Hopefully the next wait won't be as long. For those of you interested in other works, I hope to have a copy of the next chapter of "Somewhere up in the next day or two as well. Ciao._

Chapter 3

Disclaimer. I don't own these characters. Hell, I don't even own the site your reading them on. I don't even own the clothes I'm wearing. Hell twice, I'm not even wearing any clothes.

Ding, ding.

The bell on the door to the clinic rings as I push through it slowly. A quick glance to my side tells me that once more, the clinic is without receptionist. I don't know why he even bothers hiring them anymore. They never seem to last the week. A glance to my other side and I take in once more the waiting room. Plush, overstuffed chairs greet my sight. Above them the two signs, "No sex in the clinic" and "No seducing the doctor", have been joined with a third sign. "Yes, this means you". Cute. I'm gonna have to laugh with Ranma about that one.

"Oh dear," a voice says behind me. I don't bother to jump. I don't think I could make the trip back down again. "What happened to you, Setsuna?" Ranma asks, sounding concerned.

What kind of question is that? I mean look at me! Well, he should be concerned. I mean, its not every day that you have some woman you know drop by with her entire left side covered in ash and burns. I open my mouth to tell him what I think of that stupid question, and then decided that I would be better off not talking. Come to think of it I really shouldn't be walking that much either. Or thinking coherently for that matter.

"Setsuna?" Ranma's voice seems to be coming through a hazy tunnel. I'll answer him after I wake up.

---

Have you ever woken up from a feint before? No? It's weird. It's not like waking up from sleep. I mean from sleep it's just one second your asleep, and then BAM! Alarm clock ringing, conscious thought returns and your on your way. Unconsciousness is another matter. It's really slow, one second everything's dark, then you open your eyes. Now everything's white. After that it's like a thick fog burning away in the morning sun. Objects begin to make sense, slowly, and after a while thought even returns.

And that's how I found myself.

I was in some kind of examination room on a table. The table under me is wrapped in that waxy paper that doctor offices are forced to use on all of their seats. Something about sanitation. Over me is a wooly blanket, warm and safe feeling. I roll over a bit, feeling the paper crinkle uncomfortably against my back and leg, and start to go back to sleep when it hits me.

I could feel the paper all over the surface I was laying on. All over. As in no clothes between me and the paper.

That was enough to wake me up all the way.

Where am I? Did I get doped up by the Jupitarians and do something kinky again? After a second of straining myself, it starts to come back to me.

Ranma.

I sit up and get off the table slowly. On one of the sides of the room is a mirror, and I catch my reflection in it out of the corner of my eye. Wow. That's a lot of bandages.

Sitting back down on the table I had woken up on, I start to check myself over when a knock on the door catches my attention.

"Wha?" I speak up so that whoever was knocking could hear me through it.

"Are you awake already, Setsuna? I would like to make a quick check up on your wounds, if you don't mind. May I come in?"

I don't know how he does it, but even though he doesn't raise his voice at all, I can still hear him clearly.

"Su-" I start to answer, before realizing that I'm still wearing nothing but my bandages. Maybe I should cover myself up first?

Nah. The little horn dog stripped me while I was asleep, no use being modest now. Instead, I get up on the table and lay down in a provocative pose.

"Please, come in," I tell him.

The door to the examination room opens up, and Ranma backs into pulling behind him a cart with a plate of cookies and a kettle of tea. I'm up and next to him in an instant.

Forget provocative, I want those cookies.

I'm reaching for one greedily (they were fudge-mints!) when my arm is suddenly stopped halfway there in a grip like iron.

"These are for after the examination, Setsuna," Ranma chides me gently, without even looking at me as he closes the door. My mind freezes. How had he stopped my dread cookie-fist strike? That's my invincible technique! Ranma continues. "Now, please sit back down until I can finish the examination."

Alright. Snap out of it Setsuna, gotta keep up with the times. Since he won't give me any cookies, no free peek for him! I wrap myself quickly in the blanket as he turns around. "Let me put my underwear on first, you great big perv."

He cocks his head to the side at my demand. "Your underwear? I have all your clothes right here," he answers calmly as he turns around. Reaching onto the bottom tray of the cart, he pulls out a bundle and offers it to me. I take it gingerly. Unfolding my shirt, I wince as I realize that over half of it has been completely incinerated. I give it a ginger shake, and more of it dissolves. A quick glance at my pants reveal that it's kind of in the same condition. So are my bra and panties.

"Okay," I mange. "You win. Let's get this examination over with." I unwrap myself and Ranma sets to work.

He movements are quick and efficient. In a matter of minutes he has finished my general physical and is moving onto my bandages. The entire time, I don't think he took more than two looks at my body, and those were both professional. He does it all quietly too.

I hate quiet time.

"You know," I speak, killing the calm, "I think I know why you have so much trouble with attempted seductions."

"Hmm?" he murmurs as he devotes his attention to unraveling a bandage covering my ribs, apparently not even knowing my breasts two inches from his face.

"It's kind of a prove-I'm-still-attractive thing. If you were to just leer at me once, I would be so turned off. But here your are, not even noticing. Makes a girl feel unwanted.

"Hmm," he responds, applying gentle pressure to one of my ribs.

"You're not even listening to me, are you?" I ask, getting kind of pissed.

"Hmm."

"I'm gonna shove my boobs in your face if you don't say something besides, 'Hmm'," I tell him, testing my earlier theory.

"Hmm?" he asks, looking up at me as though he had just realized I was talking.

"THAT'S IT!" I bellow. I had warned him.

"HMMMM!" Ranma managed to make out as his arms waved about wildly, his seemingly imperturbable calm discarded when he finds himself planted face first right between my breasts.

Hehehehe.

----

"So what's the prognosis, doc?" I quip as Ranma steps back from his examination and starts fiddling with a clipboard. I wrap myself in the wooly blankets he had provided.

"The prognosis so far is that you're fit enough to eat those cookies," he says as he works a pen up and down on the paper he was filling out. He moves easily with the displaced air I left behind as I moved in for the food and keeps his balance. "As for your injuries, despite the fact that you came in here with second and third degree burns, you are perfectly fine." I look at him with a cookie in each hand just in time to see him put down the clipboard and pin me with a look so intense I froze like a rabbit.

"Now," he begins calmly. "Care to tell me what happened?"

---

"Setsuna Meioh! Prepare to die!" Ryaga shouts as she charges me. I look up the ground in front of me I had been studying in time to see her and dodge.

"Hey, Ryaga," I say pleasantly. "How's it going?"

"Because of you, I've seen hell! Now, prepare to suffer!" she attacked.

Ryaga is an old friend/rival/suitor from back in the day. I had met her originally on Mars at an all girl school I had been attending for a bit. Her entire family has been victim of some kind of magical random teleportation spell for as long back as anyone can remember. I think her family name is Hibiki or something, but I can never remember. After a nasty incident involving some school lunch room salads, she had sworn some kind of blood feud at me. Despite that, she's always been kind of weird around me, and most of her attacks have some kind of bazzare side effect of knocking of most of my clothes. Then she gets really distracted (and so do most every body else around) and I beat her stupid. Once I had a real battle with her that didn't end with me indecent, and I won hands down, so I know I'm a better fighter.

The fight gets on in a typical fashion. Shouts, vows of vengeance, collateral damage, ect. Finally, the two of us separate a bit, her breathing hard, and me totally untouched. Even my clothes have come out in perfect condition. Man today rocks!

"Setsuna! Prepare yourself," Ryaga shouts. "My new technique shall defeat you totally!" I smirk a bit. Yea, right.

I strike a pose. "Bring it on, chump!" I taunt her.

Growling a bit, Ryaga assumes a defensive altered cat stance, and begins to concentrate a bit. What does she thinks she's doing... My eyes widen as Ryaga's hands start to flicker, and then a fireball starts to form between her cupped palms.

"Mars flame," she begins. With a throwing motion the flames launch. "IGNITE!"

Oh shit.

---

I gulp down a cup of tea, and munch on a cookie as I finish my narrative for Ranma. He, for his part, remains with his head bowed in a meditative position.

"So Ranma, what do you think? What kind of attack was that?" I ask. I, for my part, am completely stumped (not that I'd admit it).

"It seems to me," he begins slowly, "that your friend has begun to use magic."

"WHAT!?" I shriek, leaping to my feat, using my expert skills to keep myself decent despite the fact that I'm only wearing a blanket. "How the hell did she do that?"

"Well, magic itself is present all over the galaxy. It's separated into various elements and such. You should know that much," Ranma admonished. I nod in return. Magic 101, every freshmen has to take it. "Well some people are able to tap into it without the use of standard machinery. You should know that much too. You said that Ryaga was from Mars?" I nod, and he nods to himself in return. "I've always had an improvable theory that the planets themselves affect the population that live on them strangely."

"Um, like hair color and stuff?" I guess.

"Exactly," Ranma agreed, taking a bit out of one of the cookies he had managed to grab through the blur that was me eating. "In the old days, green hair was unnatural, but these days, most Plutonians have it. I think that since Ryaga is from Mars, she has managed to use her planets affinity for fire to tap into the ever present magic around us and use it."

"Shit," I mutter. "How am I suppose to use a technique like that? I'm not a Martian!" I slump back down on the table I had woken up on, dejected.

"Hmm," Ranma says to himself quietly, and I look up at him annoyed.

"Remember what happened last time you started that," I warn him, and he puts up his hands in a warding gesture. Somehow he manages to do that while looking calm and dignified.

"When I was younger," he began slowly, "I was in a situation very similar to yours."

"I bet. An idiot father that dragged you all over the known system to train your for martial arts while simultaneously pissing off or engaging you to every person you came across, until finally when you settled down they all ganged up on you en masse?" I ask sarcastically.

Ranma smiles, ever so slightly. "Something like that. I remember once I had a rivalry with a friend, very similar to the one that you seem to be having with this Ryaga."

"So?" I ask, starting to get interested despite myself.

"In fact, he came up with a technique very similar to the one your Ryaga has..." Ranma trailed off slowly, looking lost in thought.

"Some kind of magic projectile blast that?" I ask skeptically. How many people can come up with something like that?

"Something like that," he nodded.

"Well?" I ask.

"Well, what?" he asked, seeming to shake himself awake.

"Ranma," I growl. "Don't make me punish you again."

Ranma's face seemed to freeze for a second, before he startled to chuckle. "Most people would not consider that to be a punishment, Setsuna."

"So you want more?!" I challenge, moving to unwrap myself again. He shakes his head, and averts his eyes, still smiling. That's kind of pissing me off again. What's wrong with looking at me, damn it?

"Peace, peace," Ranma pleads. Growling, I sit back again.

"So what did you do about your rival's technique?" I demand.

"Well," he began. "I had no chance of reproducing it. I just couldn't get the same kind of energies that he could. So I made a new one with energy that I could use."

"Wait a second," I interrupt. "With energy you could use? How does that help me?"

"Well, you are a Plutonian. And Pluto is the patron planet of time," he points out. He leans forward and starts to give me an intense searching look. I gulp back what ever sarcastic remark I was about to make, and the thought struck me that, my, it is rather hot in here, I wonder if he'd mind if I took off my blanket? Flushing, I look away from his look.

"I think," Ranma murmurs to himself. "I think you might be the one."

I force myself to look at Ranma again, and suddenly it occurs to me that he is VERY attractive, and I am almost naked as it is. I lick my lips as I look at his face, and something else occurs to me suddenly. His face, while attractive had a strangely timeless look to it. Like some kind of stone statue that has smoothed itself down a bit over time, but hasn't lost it's features.

And as quickly as the look had came, it is gone, and Ranma is drinking his tea like nothing had happened.

I gasp a bit at the suddenness of it. He gives me another look, though nowhere near as intense as before, and I try to cover up my surprise. "How do you know so much about magic, Ranma?"

He blinks at that, and then lowers his gaze to study his tea intensely. "A long time ago, I came across a... a magical artifact. It was entrusted in me to protect until the one who is meant to use it reclaims it. I've had it for so long that...that I've picked up a bit about how to use it."

The air around us becomes kind of awkward, and I look at the tray for more cookies, but they're all gone now.

"I..I have better be going," I finally say.

"And where are you going to go?" Ranma asks.

"Back to challenge Ryaga. I can't let anyone beat me, magic or not."

"Dressed like that?" he asks, his voice even. I glance down at myself, and suddenly remember what I'm wearing, or, rather, not wearing. I blush a bit, and I notice Ranma's lips quirk ever so slightly into a smile.

"Oh, yeah," I supply sheepishly.

"Actually, Setsuna," Ranma says, sounding hesitant. "If you're going to challenge her, there's something I'd like you to have. Please, wait a minute." He left the room quietly.

After a minute of uncomfortable silence (which I killed by humming) Ranma returns, bearing a bundle of clothes.

"These used to be mine. Back when I was more active in the art, this was almost my trademark armor. I would like you to have them," he says, laying the bundle on the bed next to me. I look at it blankly for a second, speechless, and when I look up to thank him, he has already disappeared.

Five minutes later I find Ranma in the waiting room, calmly watching the T.V. Despite the fact that I'm as quiet as a ghost, he turns when I enter and gives me a look. Well, I guess I can let him do that. After all, I am wearing his clothes. I have to admit, they are comfortable. More than that, actually. There's something about the red silk shirt and black kung-fu pants that seems...right. I had to wear a pair of boxers with them, and rather than a bra I'm using some of the bandages from earlier, but still I feel like there is some kind of power in these clothes. Like they've seen more than I have, and have taken a bit of those experiences into themselves and became stronger for it.

"So, um, Ranma," I begin, and then smack myself upside the head in my brain. 'Idiot. You sound like a little stuttering kid'. I try again, as he remains silent, waiting. "After I finish kicking Ryaga into next week, you want to hit the town for a bit?"

"Setsuna..." he says quietly, and I interrupt him before he can say anything else.

"I know about the whole, 'no sex with the doctor or in the clinic' rule, but if you're not in the clinic, and not acting like a doctor, you think you might want to hook up, or something?" I finish lamely.

Ranma's face is unreadable. And sexy. Very sexy. Finally, he answers. "We'll see."

---

"Back for more, Setsuna Meioh?" Ryaga laughs superiorly. I grit my teeth. That is such an annoying sound. "I'll beat you again this time too!" she declared, striking a victorious looking pose.

"Less talk, more fight. I got a date after this," I smirk nastily. My smirk only widens when Ryaga looks a little green. Around us, all the usual hanger-ons rivals and fiances get really funny expressions on their faces.

"You man-whores!" Akane declares, turning on the other fiances. "Which one of you is going out with that prude later!?"

I ignore the carnage that my remark sets off, and focus on Ryaga. After the green phase has passed, she starts to look pissed. Alright, now the fun starts.

"Why you..." she sputters angrily, and then, "Mar's Fire IGNITE."

This time I know what's coming at me, so I don't stand around gawking like an idiot. I clear the fireball with feet to spare. Ryaga looks a little more pissed at that.

The following fight seems to me to be more like a paintball contest crossed with a barbecue. Ryaga has herself firmly entrenched by now, and there's no way I can get close enough while dodging all the fireballs. It's hard. I'm good enough to keep myself from being burned physically again, but for how long? Ryaga isn't an idiot. No one can be and produce a technique like this.

SHIT!

That was a little close. I step back a bit and Ryaga seems to sense a lull in the battle.

"Ha ha ha ha ha!" Ryaga ha ha ha ha ha-ed. "I almost had you that time!"

What!? I look down at myself and freeze. Ranma's shirt! A good portion of the red silk sleeve has been crisped.

Ryaga says more after that, but I hardly even notice. DAMN IT! I was going to keep this shirt! Ranma had loaned it to me, and here I am, burning it up! How am I going to impress him like that!?

Slowly, as my rage builds, I feel something else building as well. Something...old.

The world around me seems to slow, the shouts and noise dimming to inaudibility. I look up, feeling like I'm the only one in the world really moving, and there it is. Another fireball coming at me.

That old thing in me breaks.

Even as the fire comes at me, my hands move in an old pattern.

"Pluto Dead Scream," I whisper in a voice that demands to be heard.

The blast of green power(temporary sector of temporal instability, I think without realizing it)overpowers the ball of fire blasting at me. It brushes through easily, shattering and dispelling the fireball, which looks pathetic in comparison to my attack. I didn't get a chance to see what happened after that, because then my world dissolved into a white mist and I knew no more.

To be continued.


	5. Chapter 5

Wild Time

Chapter 4

Disclaimer. I'm not writing for money or fame. Just so that my hordes of adoring nubile blond fans of young female flesh can, with bosoms heaving breathlessly, can follow my work. I also don't own any of these characters.

_Author's new notes: Nothing special here. Read along now._

Geez. I've lived one of the weirdest lives ever, and in that weird life I've seen some pretty strange things. This tops them all. I mean, where the hell am I? One second I'm about to be fried, the next I'm the one doing the frying, the next...WHAM! Here I am.

Allow me to describe what precisely 'here' looks like. Flat, empty, and with null visibility. The air around me is filled with a fog so thick it actually makes it a bit difficult to move. What I can see of the terrain around me is nothing. Cautious waving of my arms reveals that, in the space immediately around me there's nothing I can touch.

"Weird," I mutter, just so that I can hear my own voice. This silence is starting to get to me.

As I'm peering about, the fog around me begins to move. Slowly and sluggishly. I tense. Could there be something out there? I get into a fighting position as the movement in the fog gets closer, and then sweeps by me. I shiver a bit as a cold breeze continues on its way. The fog in front of me is slowly rolling towards me, and it feels weird against the skin of my legs and arms.

Wait a second. Against my legs? I look down to see what has happened. Ranma's clothes better not be too damaged, damn it.

"EEK!" I shriek despite myself at what I see. Check that, Ranma's clothes aren't damaged in the lest. I'm not even #&#ing wearing them anymore! Instead of the comfortable and comforting silks and linen, I'm dressed in one of the most provocative outfits I have ever worn. Body suit so tight I'm surprised you can't see the THO. Skirt so short I don't know why they don't call it a belt instead. And bows...lots of lacy colored bows. If I had seen someone else wearing this, I would have either blushed or drooled (Depending on who was wearing it).

A vague thought struck me. I wonder if I could get Ranma to see me in this?

A quick check with my hands verify that, yes, I am wearing panties. I sigh in relief.

After I get over my shock at my new dress, I get kind of pissed. Alright, who the hell stole my clothes and stuck me in this wet dream? The fog around me has been thinning under the constant breeze, and now visibility is semi- decent. I guess it would be best to get moving. The sooner I find who's responsible for this, the sooner I can beat them shitless. I start walking.

I don't know how long I walk. You ever hear that cliché expression 'could have been for a second or hours" or something like that? Well, that kind of sums it up. The entire trip is kind of hazy in my memory, like the fog that surrounded me. I remember once or twice trying to start counting my steps, but I must have messed up the count somehow, because I would suddenly find my self at number like twelve million and six or something. I don't remember getting sleepy, tired, hungry, or anything. I was just...Walking.

After god only knows how long, my eyes began to pick something out in front of me. It looms slowly out of the mists around me, a dark and foreboding shape. I feel myself tensing as I got closer. What could it be?

Finally, I'm close enough to make out what it is. A huge structure, set into nothing. A giant set of gates, ornate and old looking. Just being near them is enough to make me feel small. And across the top of the gates is a plaque reading "The Gates of Time".

Too freaking weird.

I just have enough time to wonder if maybe these mean something when I'm suddenly on more familiar ground. I leap easily out of the way as a shape streaks out of the mist behind me and slams into the ground that I had been standing on a second earlier.

"This is just what I need," I say out loud, and start to turn around. "The chance to work off... some...stress...?" I trail of, jaw gaping as I see who is behind me.

The object that had just missed impacting with the back of my skull was the business end of a huge staff. Immense, metal, with strange protuberances, and a huge semi-translucent red stone at the end, now resting against the ground. And holding the staff is...

"Ranko?" I ask, somehow shocked to the core. The petite redhead in front of me lifts up the staff and grinds its butt into the ground in front of her. She looks ridiculous small, dwarfed next to the staff, and strangely out of place in this surreal atmosphere in her immaculate business suite. Somehow, she radiates more menace and danger than all of my previous foes put together.

"Ranko," I continue. "What's going on? Why..." I'm forced to trail off as the redhead attacks again. I dodge the moves lazily, trying to find a way to disarm the redhead in front of me, to get her to talk. After one of her powerful swings, I move into strike her wrists and get some answers. Considering how wild she's swinging, it shouldn't be too...

THUCHUMP!

Ouch. I clutch my stomach tightly for a second, my mind in a sudden haze of pain. I can barely lift my head up from where I'm laying on the ground. She had hit me. Moving so fast I could barely follow, she had recovered from her overextension easily and introduced the big rock on the end to my stomach.

Ranko regards me coldly for a second, holding the position the strike had left her in, before leaping high into the air. SHIT! I move, despite the pain, and barely get my head cleared from the impact zone between that rock and the ground.

I regain my feet, dodging all the while her vicious assaults. Now that the pain had worn off a bit, I was kind of getting pissed. Who the hell did she think she was? After I get a feel for her attacks, I move in again, this time with a more vicious offense. If I knock her out, I can disarm her and immobilize her, and then question her. My fist rockets towards her face, and...

THWACKCHUMP!

My arm screams in pain, but this time at least I manage to recover my footing instantly. My eyes widen, and I realize just how much trouble I'm in.

Ranko's eyes remain cold, her face like a granite statue. Then, she attacks.

I have long considered myself to be the best there is. I've been everywhere, studied everything. When it comes to fighting, there's not much out there I don't know. Or at least I thought until now. I'm good, great, awesome. Ranko though... She's better than that. She is the ultimate elite.

After twenty seconds, I've already pulled all my restraints. It doesn't matter. I'm still barely holding my own against this mad women with a stick. A minute into the battle, she separates a bit, and I gladly latch onto the chance to catch my breath.

"Yes," Ranko says slowly, quietly. Despite the fact that she had been trying to kill me only a second ago, that voice still makes the air around me feel warm, and my cheeks hot. "You just might be her."

"Why," I panted. "Are," I huffed. "You," I wheezed. "Doing this," I sputtered.

"To test you," Ranko whispers back. Before the chill her voice gives me has run its course, she's on me again.

THWAM!

I manage to get my arm up in time, but the raw force behind the blow sends me reeling. If she keeps this up... I might not make it through this fight. That thought fills me with terror. No! I'm Setsuna Meioh of the any-time-any-place school of martial arts. I. WILL. NOT. FAIL!

"Dead scream," I whisper, and the ball of violent energy launches itself at her. There. Let's see how she takes that one!

With a deft spin of the strange rod, Ranko casually dissipates the blast.

Shit. She took that one apparently very well. She begins another charge. Desperately now, I launch the strange technique over and over again. "Dead scream. Dead scream. Dead scream."

As my redheaded tormenter charges, her form blurs and disappears from the paths of the magic, clearing it untouched.

SHUNCK!

The rod raises up in a brutal upwards strike, and I find myself airborne, horizontal, and out of control. My landing is hard and graceless. A boneless mass on the ground. And as I land, something flashes through my head.

A helicopter. Two women. A hopeless fight. A fight I new we had to win.

With those flashes, more techniques enter my head. Woozily, I regain my feet, and rejoin the fight.

By now, I'm in no condition to hold my own against such a skilled opponent. I try my best, though, and the new techniques seem effective, though I'll be screwed sideways with a two by four if I can tell where they're coming from. Using another lull in the combat (Beat down, really) I launch another attack, like the dead scream only stronger.

"Chronos Typhoon," I declare. The energy shrieks out of me, zeroing in on Ranko. With great speed, she breaks off the next attack she had been about to launch, and retreats quickly from my attack.

Finally. Something that works on her...

With another quick spin of that rod, Ranko calmly declares, "Rising dragon ascensions blast." Within my attack, two dragons make themselves known, and a tornado shreds my magic into little fragments.

My heart dies in my chest and I collapse. There's nothing left. Nothing but... Another flash.

Looking at the two women, knowing that we must win. A forbidden technique.

Stopping time.

I rise weakly too my knees. If I stop time, than I can escape, or attack and disable Ranko while she can't move. It's the only possible way I have of winning this.

But...It's forbidden. Forbidden for a reason.

To stop time, merely to keep myself from dying? To screw with the very nature of the universe just for that?

"Time..." I start, slowly. Ranko has stopped in front of me. Slowly, so slowly, she raises the orb above her head, preparing for the finishing strike.

All I would have to do is finish the attack. Time stop.

I can't. Bowing my head, I wait for the blow that will finish me off.

It doesn't come. After a minute of waiting with my head bowed, I look up.

And into the most beautiful pair of blue green eyes I have ever seen. Ranko is kneeling in front of me, looking in my face, and smiling beautifully. My heart starts beating again. Hard.

I know she was trying to kill me a second ago, but damn. I flush from the close proximity.

"You passed the test," Ranko whispers, and leans in close to me, as I fall forward. My weight too much for my arms to bear. "You're the one."

---

I wake up from my unconsciousness in a lot of pain, but in a comfortable position nonetheless. My head in Ranko's lap, my shoulders against legs, bare beneath her miniskirt.

"I have something for you," Ranko whispers. "Something I have been guarding for a very long time. You will not thank me for it. You will, in all certainty, hate me for what I am about to do to you. But I have no regrets in doing this."

With that, she put a finger over my lips to keep me from saying anything, and leaned down to kiss me, ever so gently, on the lips. My eyes went wide, my tired hands opening in shock.

And then she slipped the rod she had been carrying into my hands.

Memories strike me. Hard, fast, and painful. The Silver Millennium. The great battle. The thousand years of solitude. The Sailor Scouts. My desperate last technique. My identity.

I am Sailor Pluto.

Even as these rush through me, holding me powerless, Ranko continues. "Because of who you are, you can have no family, no friends, no other obligations. From this moment forward, the Setsuna Meioh that once you were will cease to exist. Your friends will not recognize you, your family not acknowledge you, your prior obligations not concern you. It will be like you never were."

While I lay frozen, memories and words immobilizing me, Ranko slowly stands, gently placing my sore body on the cool ground in front of the gates. Without another word, she turns, and vanishes into the perpetual mists that surround the Gates of Time.

---

Author's note: There is the end of this chapter. If anyone is still reading my

work (Especially the nubile blondes I mentioned earlier) then don't worry!

There will be more.


	6. Chapter 6

Wild Time.

By: Gabriel Blessing

Chapter 5

Disclaimer: I didn't do her! I mean 'it'. I didn't do it!

Author's note: on a totally separate topic, how many people reading this have ever heard of 'pokegirls'? I was just reading metroanime's fic, 'wild horse and pokegirls' I think it was called, and man does it rock. Now, back to the regularly scheduled program.

_Author's new note: Yes, Pokegirls still rocks. And to the reviewer who left me the amusing question, what preciscely is THO? THO is the acronym for Titty Hard On. If you don't know what that is, that you should wait till your sixteen and wikipidia it! Further note: Sorry for the long delay. Always bothered me when authors I read did it, and yet here I am, doing the same. Shrugs OH well. I'll get over it._

--

"Ma'am? Pardon me, but if your not going to buy anything, then I'm sorry but I'll have to ask you to leave."

The voice catches my attention, and I shake myself out of a daze. I blink a couple of times, trying to remember where I am, and then I focus on the speaker. A young waiter, shyly darting glances at me from where he's studying his little order notebook, or whatever they call it. Probably about eighteen.

"Coffee, thank you," I address him primly. He nods, looking kind of disappointed before scurrying off to get my order.

Young? Eighteen? I guess it doesn't take to long to forget that I'm physically eighteen, too. Who can blame me, really? I mean, I can remember things that have happened thousands upon thousands of years ago. Eighteen going on a million.

The black beverage the waiter drops off is thin, weak, and watery. I pour in about half of the sugars, before taking a sip. I guess I really have changed a lot since IT happened. Back in the day, I would have put in all the sugar, and then requested some more, before sipping.

Not a single one of them.

Sorry, that's a sudden change in direction, isn't it? Give me a second to explain. It's been almost a week since IT happened. When I say IT, I can only be referring to one thing: my reinstatement as the Sailor of Pluto. After I recovered from my memory induced paralysis, I had taken a moment to rationalize before heading back to the Pluto. I mean, everyone in the galaxy forgetting that they had once known me. What are the chances of that happening?

Pretty damn good, considering that not a single one of them recognized me.

Subconsciously I knew that they wouldn't. But nothing seems to make it seem as real is the blank stares that the Tendo's gave me. Or the glaring incomprehension in the face of my mother and even the old man when I told them I was their daughter.

I drink some more of my coffee. Now what? The memories of my time as a Sailor are there, but I feel no need to bind myself to some stupid gate for some stupid queen because some stupid past incarnation did. I'm not even Buddhist, damn it! All I really want to do is find Ranko and make her undo whatever the hell it was she did. All I really want is all my rivals to recognize me, even if just so they can attack. All I really want...

I just want to find Ranma.

Of all the people I looked for since regaining my memories, he's the only one I couldn't find. Ryoga, random teleportation curse and all I managed to track down (somewhere on the southern hemisphere of Saturn was where I finally caught up to her), but of that handsome, intelligent, caring, and calm chiropractor? Nothing.

I'm gonna track down that damn Ranko, and beat her into a pulp (using my new memories I'm sure I could beat her this time) and then I'm gonna make her undo this. I'm gonna smack her like a redheaded stepchild. I'm gonna tear out her eyes and shove them down her pants so she can watch me kick her butt. I'm gonna...

I'm gonna do nothing of the sort, damn it. No matter what she did to me, I just can't work myself up to hate her, and I'm disgusted by that.

"May I join you?" a new voice breaks in on my silent reverie.

Without looking I snap back an answer. "No. Bugger off."

Despite my tone, the voice chuckles a bit, and the noise of the chair across from me greets my ears. "I remember you as being a lot less irritable, Setsuna."

Remember? Someone remembers me? Desperately I raise my eyes and come face to face with...

"Hotaru?" I stutter. The woman that I had seen speaking with Ranko back when I still had a life. But now, more memories return to me. Memories of a time in one of my past lives. Just a short while before my death from using my attack, the Time Stop. My eyes widen, and I instinctively scurry back from the woman in front of me, my chair making a scraping noise on the ground as it's dragged back with me. A second later, I calm down. Think, damn it. Back then, I feared the coming of the Silence, rightly so. But now, so many thousands of years later, it's a pretty safe assumption that whatever was going to happen would have already happened by now if it was going to happen at all. Regaining my composure, I sit back down.

"What are you doing here?" I ask in a commanding voice.

"Now that's a lot more like I remember you," Hotaru answers, smiling a little more. I answer her amusement with cool self control, and this makes the smile lessen a bit. "I think I liked you more before your memories had returned. You were less cold, more human."

"You had been watching me? For how long? What happened, all those years ago? Who is Ranko?" I snap out. I need answers because I have a lot of questions.

"Please," Hotaru answers calmly, patting the table next to one of my hands calmingly. "Give me a moment and I will answer your questions."

I take a deep breath, and give her a second. She smiles at me again, and waves the young waiter over to place an order. I take the opportunity to study her a bit. It's weird. When I look at her, I have two completely different sets of memories. One, the more recent one, is of a quiet and beautiful woman compassionately offering her home to a friend. The older one though, the one from my past life, is of a quiet shy girl with a terrible inferiority complex with terrible extra-dimensional creature of destruction living in her. Comparing the two brings a strange sense of deja vu to the scene.

After the waiter leaves, depositing a glass of some hot tea for Hotaru, I start my questions again. "Now, tell me what happened. I remember going to fight Mistress 9, but after my attack..." I trail off, and Hotaru nods sympathetically.

"After your attack killed you, you missed out on a lot," Hotaru begins. "I'm assuming that you're still a little out of sorts from your recent memory regaining experience..."

"And how do you know about that?" I interrupt. I feel like a lawyer cross examining a witness (though I'll never admit to comparing myself to one of those. Ever since the Queen banished them back to the negaverse, it's been kind of a taboo subject across the system).

"Allow me to explain it all at my own pace," Hotaru gently insists, holding a hand how to stop my next question. After taking a sip of her tea, she picks up where she left off. "I'm assuming that you're still out of sorts, otherwise I'm sure that you'd just use the Gates of Time to review the whole matter , so I'll just give you a run down of the events. You can look up the details at a later time. Let me start right after your attack." Taking another sip, she begins.

"When you stopped time, you allowed Sailor Neptune and Uranus to escape their otherwise certain deaths in the helicopter. They used this to the best of their advantage, and managed to make it into the compound. However, before they could manage to kill me, Sailor Moon also managed to make it in, and stopped them. In the following struggle, she managed to not only defeat Pharaoh 90, but also save me, and convince the Outer Scouts that she was indeed the Princess."

"Well done," I murmur to myself. I can remember having worries about that. I really had no idea how I was going to convince Haruka and Michiru to follow Usagi back then. The only thing those two respected was strength. Truth be told, they were kind of arrogant, refusing to believe that there was any other path but that of sacrifice. Tragic hero complex, or something like that. I wonder how they've changed since then?

"After that their was a brief respite, followed by another evil Intelligence, followed by another time of peace, followed by another Intelligence, and so forth. The other Scouts carried on as best they could, but eventually it became a bit much for them. I joined in too, after I had been restored by our Princess, but it was too much for us. When things looked the worst, that was when she showed up."

"She?" I ask in a whisper.

"Ranko," Hotaru replies. "She was very different back then. But then, I suppose we all were," she adds, almost to herself. Shaking her head, she continues. "She was much more brash and arrogant, as well as harsh and insulting. She would appear out of nowhere, wearing a civilian clothes and bearing your Garnet Orb and the Key. She would then proceed to utterly decimate our enemies. At first, all the Scouts were suspicious, especially since she would just brush off our questions about who she was and what she was doing with your weapon. She'd just disappear or say something rude and disappear. After a bit though, when our foes started to get stronger, she would stay, help, and train us. With her aid we all became much stronger."

"You said, 'wearing civilian clothes'. What do you mean by that?" I ask.

"I mean she'd just show up wearing whatever. She could transform. She had to do it occasionally, against the really strong adversaries, but it was like she disliked being a Scout."

"Transform? In what fashion? And what do you mean 'dislike being a Scout'?"

"She would have a transformation sequence, and would end up in a Scout uniform, very much like your own. And as for her distaste with being a Scout," and here Hotaru begins to smile slightly, "I mean she would always act nervous and embarrassed. Personally," she adds, leaning forward in a conspiring fashion, "I think it had something to do with the uniform. After one battle, Haruka made a comment about the color of her panties, and Ranko blushed as red as her hair, before calling Haruka a tomboy." Hotaru gives up any pretense of dignity then, and giggles aloud at the memory.

I, myself, am having a little trouble with all of this. Loud? Brash? Rude? Overly modest? It was almost like Hotaru is talking about a different Ranko. I remain quiet, and after a moment Hotaru regains control of herself and continues.

"Finally, after many terrible battles, Usagi managed to defeat the final adversary, and proceeded to found Crystal Tokyo, and bring peace to the system. After that happened, Ranko kind of just disappeared. In the next thirty or forty years the world expanded and grew, and soon the Moon, Mars, and Venus were all up for colonization." Hotaru stops to sip at her tea for a bit more. "Sixty years after that, plans were already being drawn up for colonization of more of the system. And a little after that, they were set into action. The Scouts all split up, each returning to the planets that they had been born to rule so many years ago."

While Hotaru was speaking, I had started to study here, and at this point a sudden flash of inspiration strikes me. "That would be about the time that you left the Court of the Moon as well, wouldn't it? About the time it was discovered that any life on Saturn is an impossibility, true?"

Hotaru looked at the table for a second, before answering. "Yes. In such times of peace, having a Scout for destruction seemed very inappropriate. I grew ill of the constant fear, and left the Court in self imposed exile. That was the next time I ran into Ranko." Hotaru stops her narration and looks up, pinning me with a look that would have done the old me proud. I return it calmly. "What I am about to say to you is in no way to be repeated to anyone. The only reason that I tell you, is so to help you understand why Ranko has done what she did to you."

I nod my acquiescence.

"It was quite by accident that I stumbled upon Ranko. I had been wandering the city, enjoying the peace, when I stumbled across a cemetery. I don't even remember the reason I entered, but when I did, I stumbled across a woman mourning at a grave." Hotaru nods when I draw in a startled breath. "I offered my comfort to the grieving Ranko, and led the weeping woman back to her house for rest. After a nights rest, Ranko conferred in me about what had happened."

"More coffee, ladies?" a voice asks, and the me and Hotaru start a bit. The young waiter looks apologetic at having started us, and quickly got us our refills before scurrying off.

"So," I begin, trying to regain the ruined mood. "Who was the departed?"

"You must understand, that even in her grief, Ranko was very tight lipped on the subject. Very much like yourself, back then." I allow that to pass unchallenged. I'm far to mature to rise to such obvious bait. The moment Hotaru's eyes are averted, though, I pour some complementary hot sauce into her tea. "What I could gather, though, was that Ranko had very little option in becoming a Scout, and that she had been forced into it. I believe, that being forced to such a position had in some way alienated the woman that she herself had been in love with. And with the magic of the Scouts keeping Ranko young, the woman that Ranko had loved had grown old, withered, and eventually died."

"I see," I murmur. Hotaru nods as well, and takes a sip of her tea. After she swallows, her face scrunches up into a cute little face, and she sticks out her tongue. She gives her cup a glare, and then gives me and the open bottle of hot sauce near me a suspicious look.

I keep my face totally calm. Right about now, though, I begin to notice something about Hotaru. Maybe it was the stress of the situation finally relaxing, but I had forgotten just how devastatingly beautiful Hotaru really is. I feel a little pang. I may have the memory of thousands of years, but my physical body hasn't truly physically matured yet, so I still look like an eighteen year old. Damn it, if this is the level of competition going for Ranko entails, I might be better off staying with Ranma. If I could just find him, that is.

After she carefully pushes the tainted tea to the side, Hotaru continues. "After that, Ranko and myself became something of friends. Partners in solitude, if you will. After several hundred years of such, she chose to confide in me as to what her situation truly is."

"And what might that be?" I ask, as she pauses dramatically again.

"Her situation? It's you, Setsuna Meioh. You're what her situation is," Hotaru answers, looking me in my eyes.

To be concluded in the next chapter.


	7. Chapter 7

Wild Times

By: Gabriel Blessing

Conclusion

_Author's new notes: Man it's been a while! No major changes to this one. I think it really does come together nicely. Enjoy, and look for my brand spanking new work! It'll be up on my profile if you're interested!_

Disclaimer. I don't own any of these people, ideas, concepts, places, or any thing else that might be possessed.

It's a lonely place, where I stand. The landscape around me is gray and flat. A low, ground clinging mist covers the gentle rolls of the land and leeches all the color out of the earth around me.

No, it's not the Gates of Time. Where am I, you ask?

A cemetery.

It doesn't really matter what the name of the cemetery is. It's not a name you'll ever recognize or hunt down. It's not where the cemetery is that matters anyway. It's who is in it that does matter.

Ranko.

It doesn't take much effort to move silently. The mists around me seem to drain the surroundings of sound as well as color. I feel like I'm moving through some kind of dream: a nightmare.

It hadn't taken me that long to figure out where Ranko must be. After the story that Hotaru told, I could think of only one place she could possibly go to, really. Getting the name out of the cemetery out of Hotaru had actually been the hardest part of the trip. And now I'm here.

As cemeteries go, this is a pretty good one. The landscape is flat, like I said earlier, and through some trick of agriculture, weeping willows grow abundant despite the fact that they usually only grow by lakes. The grave I'm looking for lays hidden behind a grove of these sad plants. The trees are all huge. Giants among their kind. I can guess just how old they are, and who planted them. Moving so carefully the fog around me remains undisturbed, I slip among the green curtain, and look upon the scene within.

There's only one grave in the grove. Surrounded as it is by a wall of green, the atmosphere within feels other-worldly. The grave itself is simple. Just slab of limestone with two simple words carved on its front: Akane Tendo. It doesn't have any years on it, but if it's as old as Hotaru says it is, then this probably isn't the first grave stone to mark this spot. I turn my attention to the only other person in the grove. My eyes are greeted by black and red silk and black hair. My eyes widen, my breath draws in...

"Ranma!" before I can stop myself. The kneeling man jerks, like he was waking up, and half turns, even as I berate myself. Damn it, losing control like that. If this is anything like the others, he's probably never heard of me. That's not necessarily a bad thing. I can still convince him to have a go with me. It'll be like starting over...

"Setsuna," Ranma murmurs, his eyes hidden from my sight by his bangs. I freeze, and he turns back to his grave. The sky above is gray and heavy.

"Ranma?" I whisper. "You know me?" How? How is this possible? This.. This...

This is great! Maybe I still have a chance with him!

I take a hesitant step towards Ranma, but he doesn't do anything.

Second thought: What is he doing here? Why would he be at the grave of a chick that must have passed away way before his time? The only ones who probably know about this are me, Hotaru, and Ranko. A thought chills me to the bone. What if he and Ranko are an item? That would kill my chances with both of them! Please, let it be any thing else.

"I've lost control of it, now," Ranma says into the silence. I blink, calling my attention back to the man in front of me. "I've been able to do it on my own for so long now that I've forgotten how inconvenient it can really be."

"Control of what?" I ask.

Ranma takes a look at the sky and snorts softly in what sounds like amusement. "You'll see in just a second. It's about to start raining."

I boggle. Raining? What does that have to do with anything?

Ranma continues. "Now that I no longer bear the mantle, my curse is just that once more: a curse."

"Curse?" I ask, confused. "What curse...?" My question cuts short in my mouth when first one, and then another, and then dozens of raindrops fall down on me. Ranma too is struck by the rain, and before my eyes where once he was, there now knelt none other then...

"Ranko?"

"The curse is very old," Ranko tells me, pushing a strand of now crimson hair that had become plastered to her face back. "Gender changing, with the application of hot or cold water."

"..." I reply wittily. I try to shut my gaping mouth, but I think my sudden face fault had sprained something.

"I suppose you have some questions," Ranko says. "Like who am I, and why did I do that terrible thing to you. Well, I suppose those are fair questions. Let me give you honest answers."

I bring my hand up to my mouth, and push it closed. Ranko continues.

"All those years ago, when you used your forbidden technique, the Time Stop, you died. I'm sure you know that. After all, you have the memories of all those years before, now. I'm sure you also know that that isn't the first time you've used that technique. Through the ages, you have used it many times before, and died each time. I'm sure that every time before, you must have felt like you did it for a good reason. You're wrong. There is no good reason to disturb the very nature of reality for something as petty as your personal goals, or those of some queen you serve."

I want to object, to raise my voice and shout her down, but I can't. I think my jaw is still sprained. Another five minutes rest first.

"You have a very important duty: to protect the Time Gates above all else. As long as you protect them, you have some leeway in what you do with your spare time. You chose to aid some queen to bring peace and prosperity to a war torn system. That is noble. But using the forbidden techniques for that is wrong." Ranko pauses for a second, and then continues. "Forgive me, I'm lecturing. Let me get back on track. You've used the forbidden techniques before. That you know. When you use it, you are removed from the timeline for a period of time before reawakening. That you also know. What you don't know is that while you are temporarily incapacitated, then another must guard the Gates in your stead." Ranko, or Ranma, or whoever it is in front of me turns and gives me a glance out of the corner of his eye.

She's right. I didn't know that. My jaw is working now, but I decide to keep it shut just a little while longer.

"Every time it happens, a different person is chosen to act as kind of a warden to your powers. Someone to hold onto the Garnet orb and the Key to the Gates until you are ready to resume your position. In order to ensure that the warden has no other uses for the Talismans besides keeping them ready for you, they are deleted." My blood runs cold at the word. "Everything about them is removed from the time line. Every trace."

"This must be wrong," I blurt. "Never before..."

"Exactly," Ranko cuts me off. "Every other warden has seen through their task. At the first presentable opportunity, they have awakened you, so that they could be free of the solitude, to start a new life."

"Why?" I feel strange. This whole situation is unbelievable, even for one such as me. "Why was your time different?"

"Because," Ranko says quietly. "It was my duty, and I'm not going to see it done wrong. I realized something, after a couple of years as a warden. I realized that as long as you just reawakened, you would always be able to use the Time Stop again. It was nothing but a delay to you, a minor inconvenience. I had to make it something else. I had to make the very thought of using the Time Stop again painful."

I feel rage start to rise in my gut. "By doing what?" I demand. "Making me have to go through what you did? By loosing all my friends and family? How does that make me not want to use it, huh? How!?" I shout the last bit.

"You're not the first incarnation of yourself between now and then," Ranko whispers to me, and my rage turns to ice. "There have been others. I never awakened any of them. I waited, watching you carefully. Very carefully. All your other incarnations were shallow. They thought only of themselves. They wouldn't hesitate to see their ideals through. After many century of waiting, it suddenly dawned on me. An epiphany, if you will." Ranko trails off.

"What did you discover?" I whisper. "What could you have possibly discovered?" I ask in a more normal tone of voice. The ice inside of me is thawing again, as the flames of wrath start to thaw it.

"Here I was, a fighter and nothing else, waiting for hundreds of years to make sure a task I didn't ask for, and didn't like, was done right. Sticking to it despite the fact that it had cost me everything I held dear. If I wanted to turn the Talismans back over to someone who would do the job right, I needed to turn them over to someone...like myself," Ranko says quietly.

"What?" I gape, startled.

"Your entire life. Your father, friends, rivals, fiancés, everything. It has been a mirror image of my own." Ranko suddenly busts out into a grin. "Except for the curse of course." Her joviality evaporates. "Tell me, Setsuna Meioh, of the Anytime-Anyplace school of martial arts. Too ever use the technique Time Stop again is forbidden. To do it is to sacrifice your honor. Will you? If your queen and your life are in danger. If the only way to save the Silver Millennium is to use it, will you?"

The bottom of my stomach drops out beneath me. I want to shout defiantly. It's impossible. There's no way you could ever have arranged every detail of my life. No way that I would let the queen die if I could save her. Heck. There's no way your life could have possibly have been as weird as mine was. But I can't. To tell him that, would be a lie.

Ranko hears my silence, interprets it correctly, and kills it. "I thought so." Ranko stands up from where she's kneeling in another one of those insanely graceful sudden movements that she uses. "I know you must hate me. But knowing that I have finished my job and did it right, knowing that I've given the Talismans to someone who won't make the mistakes she used to....Well, it makes having lost everything I ever cared about a worthwhile sacrifice." Without turning around, Ranko starts to walk away.

"You're wrong," I whisper, and Ranko freezes. "I don't hate you. Damn it all a thousand times. I don't." I swallow as Ranko turns and gives me another one of those so-intense-it-can-melt-glass-looks. I might have a thousand times more years and memories that even one as long lived as Ranko is, but I still feel like a flushing school girl when I get one of those looks. "Ranko, or Ranma, or whoever you are. What are you going to do now?"

"Ranma. My name is Ranma in both genders. And as for what I'm going to do now..." Ranma trails off. "I guess I'll just go some place peaceful and rest."

"Nah-ah. Nope. No way. Not going to happen," I tell the redhead, and Ranma gives me a bewildered glance. "I'm not just going to let you walk into the sunset. What about Hotaru? Or me, for that matter. Remember? There might only be a couple of people out there who can remember it still, but I did kick Ryaga's ass. You owe me a night on the town at least." I flash a suddenly cocky grin at a now gaping Ranma, and cross the distance between the to of us. Putting one arm around her shoulder, I leer at the now flabbergasted woman who gave me so much trouble.

I guess it's like what Ranma said earlier. As long as I guard the Gates, no one really cares what (or as the case might be, who) I'm doing, right? And since Ranma did his job so well, I no long have an overwhelming urge to go throw myself in front of a train for Serenity (though she'll always have my support, within reason), that leaves me with a lot of spare time on my hands, ne? And I have a feeling that those times are gonna be wild.

THE END


End file.
